On Unseen Imprints and Sensory and Tactile Memory of Printmaking: Interview with Koichi Yamamoto

Transmission 415: Interview with Koichi Yamamoto

Professor Koichi Yamamoto is an internationally acclaimed printmaker, artist, and educator. His work bridges traditional print craft with boundary-pushing contemporary techniques, and his practice is deeply rooted in the possibilities of the art form.

His path has been defined by global curiosity. The international trajectory of Koichi Yamamoto began in Japan, before taking him to Wyoming in 1983. After graduating with a BFA from Portland’s Pacific Northwest College of Art in 1992, he spent several formative years in Eastern Europe and Scandinavia. His pursuit of traditional materials led him through Poland, Slovakia—where he studied copper engraving under Dušan Kállay—and Denmark as a textile designer. This nomadic study culminated in 1999 when he achieved his MFA from the University of Alberta, Canada.

Yamamoto’s distinct background reflects his mastery of both detailed copper engravings and massive interactive installations, as well as a deep philosophical inquiry into fluid mechanics, atmosphere, and the sublime. Through his work and teaching, he explores the relationship between process, material, experimentation, and image-making, bringing a thoughtful and contemporary perspective to a medium with a long and evolving history.

His practice balances technical knowledge with an openness to discovery—embracing the unexpected possibilities that emerge through the physical and often unpredictable process of printmaking. Conceptually, his art investigates the intersections of memory, atmosphere, and fluid dynamics. By experimenting with alternative structures and unexpected variables—such as the open sky or chemical interactions—he frequently pushes the medium beyond the flat surface and outside traditional gallery walls.

His diverse output spans from the hyper-intimate, meticulous discipline of small copperplate engravings to massive monotypes and wind-borne, intaglio-printed kite installations. This work has been exhibited extensively across the globe, securing his reputation as an innovator who continually redefines the physical and conceptual limits of printmaking. Committed to arts education, he currently serves as a Professor of Art at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, having previously taught at Utah State University and the University of Delaware.

Official site | Instagram | School of Art (University of Tennessee)

As a professor of printmaking, he is also committed to the development of the next generation of artists, encouraging students to engage critically with both traditional techniques and new approaches to making. 

Printmaking is often described as a process of repetition. Do you see repetition as a form of discipline, discovery, or both? What can printmaking do that drawing or painting simply cannot?

I see repetition as both discipline and discovery. In printmaking, repeating an action does not necessarily produce the same result. Each impression contains subtle changes in pressure, ink, moisture, registration, and the condition of the matrix.

The first trial is always an experiment, and the result is not necessarily what I anticipated. By repeating the process and learning from each impression, I gradually move closer to the original idea. At the same time, repetition reveals unexpected variations that can lead the work in a new direction.

What distinguishes printmaking from drawing or painting is its indirectness. I work on one surface, but the final image appears on another—reversed, transferred, and transformed through pressure. Unexpected results are inherent in this process, and they often lead to discovery, innovation, and creative solutions to technical or visual problems.

Printmaking also allows an image to exist in multiple states rather than as a single, fixed object. For me, a print is not simply a reproduction. Each impression is the record of a unique physical event.

Do you begin a new work with an image in mind, or does the image emerge from the process? If we could watch one of your prints being made from the very first mark to the final impression, where would we see the biggest transformation?

I usually begin with a structure or physical phenomenon rather than a fully resolved image.  I may be thinking about the flow of water, atmospheric pressure, turbulence, symmetry, or the tension between opposing forces. The image gradually emerges through my interaction with the materials.

The greatest transformation occurs during the transfer from the matrix to the paper. Before printing, the image exists as ink on a plate or as marks engraved into copper; it is still provisional. Pressure brings the paper, ink, and matrix together, transforming the image into something I can no longer directly control. The image is also reversed, creating both physical and psychological distance from what I have made. When I lift the paper, I am not simply checking whether the image has printed correctly. I am encountering it as a new object for the first time. That moment of revelation often determines the next direction of the work.

Your work explores water, atmosphere, and fluid mechanics—themes rooted in an early childhood memory of printing a red snapper as a gyotaku. Is your art an attempt to decode that first visceral memory, or has your visual language evolved beyond its origin?

A print is a physical record of something that once existed—a ghost, or evidence of its former presence. This idea is essential to gyotaku. The fish will eventually be eaten and consumed, but its impression remains. That desire to record and preserve a temporary existence continues to resonate throughout my work.

My childhood experience of gyotaku remains an important point of origin, although I did not understand its significance at the time. I remember the physicality of applying ink to the fish, pressing paper against its surface, and watching its body become an image. The fish was transformed into a record of touch, texture, and life. It became both an object and its own memory.

My visual language has evolved considerably, but I continue to return to that fundamental experience of contact and transformation. Water, atmosphere, and fluid mechanics allow me to investigate forces that are often invisible but constantly shape our environment. In that sense, I may still be decoding the experience of gyotaku. I remain interested in how physical reality becomes an image and how an impression can preserve the presence of something that is no longer there. The subjects have expanded, but the original curiosity remains.

How much of your work is driven by intention versus discovery? What has been your most productive mistake, and what do artists sacrifice when they try to make printmaking too predictable?

Intention gives me direction, but discovery gives the work its life. An idea creates an intention, and that intention suggests a method for approaching or solving a problem. During the process, however, unexpected results inevitably occur. We often describe these results as mistakes, but these mistakes inform solutions to existing problems. I establish certain conditions and then allow the process to respond. I am not interested in complete control. I want enough control to recognize when something unexpected has become meaningful.

My most productive mistakes have involved accidental transfers. These incidents revealed movement and spatial relationships that I could not have consciously designed. Rather than immediately correcting them, I began incorporating their logic into the work.

Your work spans the intimate discipline of small copper plates and massive, wind-borne installations. How does your relationship with resistance and material change when you scale up from a handheld plate to a structure meant to interact with the open sky?

The scale and method of presentation may differ, but the ideas and content often emerge from the same roots. With a small copper plate, resistance is concentrated between my hand, the burin, and the metal. Every movement is deliberate, and even a slight variation in pressure changes the engraved line. The process is intimate, slow, and physically contained.

When I work on a large kite installation, resistance becomes environmental. I am no longer working only with the resistance of a material; I am negotiating with wind, gravity, lift, drag, tension, and distance. The structure must remain light enough to fly yet strong enough to withstand unpredictable forces. Control becomes distributed among the artist, the structure, and the atmosphere.

Despite the difference in scale, both processes depend on dynamic equilibrium. The burin must meet the copper at the correct angle and pressure, just as a kite must meet the wind with the correct balance of tension and flexibility. In both cases, I do not try to overcome resistance. I listen to it and work with it.

What does the physical resistance of a material teach you? Do you think differently when you are carving, inking, printing, or looking at the final impression?

The physical resistance of a material teaches me how to approach it. Rather than fighting against the material, I learn to work with its particular qualities. Copper, ink, paper, fabric, and wind each communicate differently and demand patience and attentiveness. If I impose too much force, the material may fail; if I apply too little, nothing happens. Making becomes a form of negotiation.

I think differently during each stage of the process. When engraving, my attention is concentrated on pressure, direction, and the accumulation of lines. While inking, I think about density, transparency, and how the ink occupies or leaves the surface. During printing, I become conscious of timing, pressure, moisture, and contact. When viewing the final impression, I step away from those technical decisions and ask whether the image has developed an independent presence.

Each stage requires a different kind of intelligence. The hand understands something while carving that the eye may not yet recognize. Later, the printed image reveals relationships that were impossible to see while working directly on the matrix.

In developing processes such as the Reflective Transfer Method, you invite variability and the unexpected into production. When a print fails technically but succeeds artistically, how do you decide which side has won?

Technical success and artistic success are not always the same. A print may have uneven pressure, an unexpected transfer, or imperfect registration and still possess a compelling sense of space, movement, or energy. Conversely, a technically flawless print may communicate nothing beyond its own craftsmanship.

In my Reflective Transfer Method, variability is built into the selection and combination of images. Once an image has been transferred and completed through reflective symmetry, the human mind naturally tries to make sense of it. If an unexpected mark appears twice, its repetition gives it a sense of intention.

I establish the process, but each transfer produces differences that cannot be completely repeated. I evaluate the result by asking whether the unexpected element belongs to the visual language of the work.

If a technical failure creates a more convincing artistic experience, then the artwork has succeeded. However, accepting a chance is not the same as accepting everything. Editing remains essential. Discovery becomes meaningful only when the artist can recognize and develop it.

Your journey has taken you from Osaka and Wyoming to Poland, Slovakia, Denmark, Canada, and many parts of the United States. How has this peripatetic life transformed your internal visual language rather than simply changing your scenery? What do you notice now as a printmaker that you might otherwise have missed?

Living in different countries taught me that visual language is shaped not only by landscape, but also by systems of thought, histories, materials, and ways of working. In Eastern Europe, I encountered rigorous traditions of drawing, copper engraving, and the graphic arts. In North America, I became increasingly interested in scale, experimentation, landscape, and collaboration. My Japanese background continues to inform my sensitivity to architectural asymmetry, emptiness, impermanence, and the animistic presence of natural forces.

These experiences do not remain separate in my work. They overlap, interact, and sometimes conflict, creating a visual language that is neither entirely Eastern nor Western.

As a printmaker, I have learned to notice traces: erosion on rock, compression in soil, reflections on water, atmospheric layers, and repeated patterns created by wind. I often see the world as a collection of matrices and impressions. I pay attention not only to objects themselves, but also to the forces that formed them and the records they leave behind.

From his early memories of printmaking to his mature themes of fluidity and nature, he bridges his specific technical innovations with a philosophical, explorative,  constant creative and perspective. 

As a professor, what do students tend to worry about that you wish they would let go of? What advice do you give students that you have found hardest to follow yourself?

Students often worry about making a successful image too quickly. They want to know what the work means before they have given themselves enough time to make, fail, observe, and reconsider. I encourage them to release the pressure to produce a recognizable style or a perfect result.

I am also still a student—learning, discovering, and becoming excited by new methods of solving problems. We all seek recognition and acknowledgment, but as a teacher, I try to focus students’ attention on the excitement of discovery. I often think that art is long and life is short. We are capable of creating extraordinary work, but reaching a deep level of understanding takes a lifetime, and we may never feel completely satisfied. The meaning of artistic practice is not simply completing the work. What matters most is the effort to find a solution. The journey and the process are often more valuable than reaching the goal.

I often tell students not to become too attached to a particular outcome. Yet that is also the advice I find hardest to follow. After investing time and labor in a work, it can be difficult to admit that it needs to change—or that it has failed.

Teaching continually reminds me that uncertainty is not evidence that the work is going badly. It is often the condition necessary for meaningful discovery. I ask my students, and myself, to remain in that uncertain space a little longer.

 In an era of infinite digital reproduction and a culture driven by speed, what does “original” mean to you? Is the slowness of traditional printmaking becoming more valuable? What can AI and digital tools never truly replicate?

In printmaking, “original” does not necessarily mean unique. An edition may contain multiple impressions, but each is an original because it results directly from the artist’s matrix and the physical act of printing. Originality resides in the process, decisions, and material history of the work—not simply in the number of copies.

The slowness of traditional printmaking has become increasingly valuable because it requires sustained attention. Engraving a plate, preparing paper, mixing ink, and operating a press create a different relationship with time. Slowness allows thought to develop through the body rather than only through immediate visual selection.

AI and digital tools can be valuable parts of contemporary practice. Each person possesses a unique combination of memories, experiences, and ways of thinking. These shape how we connect seemingly unrelated ideas, sometimes through associations that appear random but are deeply personal. AI may eventually develop the capacity to retain and respond to an individual’s unique memories and patterns of thought.

However, it cannot replace physical resistance, bodily memory, or the unpredictable contact among ink, matrix, pressure, and paper. It can simulate the appearance of an engraved line, but not the experience of pushing a burin through copper. The handmade print contains evidence of time, touch, resistance, and risk. That lived encounter is what gives it presence.

Photos and images courtesy of © Koichi Yamamoto

Dominique Musorrafiti

Ciao! My name is Dominique. I’m Italian and I’m proud to be a mix. My father was an Italian chemical engineer and high school teacher, with Greek and Polish heritage. My mother is Haitian, she was high school language teacher, with Dominican, Spanish, French, Portuguese, African and Native American heritage. Being a mix makes me appreciate to want to understand different cultures and lifestyles. I grew up in Italy, lived few years in Haiti, travel around main European capitals, lived many years in China, in Spain and UK. Traveling makes me feel that we can learn something from every situation in every part of the world.